


In The Dying Light

by gemmwin



Category: Scarecrow Series - Matthew Reilly
Genre: Conspiracy, Horror, Romance, Thriller, Well - Freeform, Zombiepocalypse, bit of sex, impending doom, set right after ice station, shady shit, zombiepocalypse with a twist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-02
Updated: 2015-03-02
Packaged: 2018-03-15 23:58:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3466844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gemmwin/pseuds/gemmwin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Deep in the snowy forests of Germany, a terrible accident has occurred. Its consequences are earth-shattering. Its solutions are impossible. And the entire living world is at stake.<br/>A team of United States marines are sent in to deal with the situation - tough men, men of action, men who get the job done as swiftly and professionally as possible. But they will soon find themselves clinging to survival as the reality around them is tested. Soon they will be running from shadows and fearing the bumps in the night.<br/>Shane M Schofield has gone to hell many times before; in Bosnia, in Antarctica, in Utah. But never has hell come back to him. <br/>Until now, that is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In The Dying Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [captainfalcon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainfalcon/gifts).



Dr Hopkins was running. 

With his white lab coat flailing behind him, the older man sprinted down the flickering corridor, the stitch in his sides an all too personal reminder of what was at stake. Behind him, the echoes of desperate, angry voices called his name. His shoes ached painfully and his breath was short and sharp, but he didn’t stop moving.

The lights above him began to blink every couple of paces, no doubt due to some malevolent saboteur with a pair of bolt cutters and half a brain. He fought hard to keep his panic at bay; this was the scariest moment of his life.

He rounded a corner and almost knocked himself unconscious as he smacked into something; another human being perhaps. For a fleeting moment, he’d thought he’d ran into (gulp) one of them, but found it was only his coworker, the young Dr Juarez.

‘Jim!’ Breathed Dr Juarez as she scrambled to her feet.

‘Vera!’ 

‘You can’t go that way, they’re already in the Biotoxins lab!’ Vera panted, leaning on the wall for support.‘Oh Jesus Christ, they’re coming for me! We have to go!’

Jim opened his mouth to speak, but suddenly, without warning, the bright row of halogen lights above the two scientists blinked out, plunging the whole corridor into darkness. Evidently, whoever was attacking the power system had succeeded.

‘Oh shit, the power’s out!’ 

Automatic emergency lights sprung to life a moment later, illuminating the walls with a hazardous flashing orange. With each passing flash, Jim could see the terror rising on his colleague’s face. Vera’s dark hair whipped past him as she stole a glance over her shoulder yet again.

‘Oh my god.’ Vera wailed.

Jim didn’t know what to do. The two of them were stuck; bordered on both fronts by hordes of them. He didn’t have a clue what to do - they were scientists for god’s sake! So, like most doctors he’d come to know at this facility, he employed a common tactic: he made a split-second decision and ran with it.  
‘This way,’ he yelled, tugging her arm as they both broke into a run. They headed back the way Hopkins had come, towards the Recovery Center and away from whatever was chasing Vera.

The pair thundered down the corridor, guided only by the alarm lights, their silhouettes defined in the near blackness by the regular orange flash of the rotating bulkhead warning lights. Through the chaos, their hands found each others’, and for a brief second, all Jim wanted to do was stop and just hold another human being for a few precious moments before everything inevitably went to shit.

Vera reached the emergency doors at the end of the corridor first and began wrenching the handle open. It didn’t budge - Jim had seen to that minutes earlier when he had broken the security system and manually locked the door. Vera slammed into the sleek metal door again and again, beginning to sob. ‘Open up! OPEN UP!’

Jim looked around wildly for the stair access and spotted the green sticker on a door to his left. He kicked the pathetic-looking white door and was surprised to see the lock buckle straight away; he was never one for athletics. But, he figured, adrenaline was all he had going for him right now.

Vera practically climbed over him in her haste to get to the escape route. The pair headed upwards towards the surface, their work boots clanging against the rickety metal grilling of the staircase. Jim glanced up and saw the spiralling stairway stretch away from him towards the roof.

Two minutes later they arrived at the ground floor of the scientific facility, and Vera let out a moan of relief when she saw the hatch in the ceiling. Hopkins, who was hot on her heels, boosted her up and she pushed the hatch open with such force that it sprung open and slammed open loudly on the roof above them.

Vera pulled herself up and out onto the snow-covered roof, the snow crunching under her patent black leather heels. She turned to lean down and pull Jim up, who beckoned with desperate arms.

‘C’mon, c’mon!’ Jim cried, snapping his fingers.

Vera hauled him up quickly and the pair began to run along the roof. It was a bizarre sight; two terrified civilians, one with messy black hair falling out of a loosened ponytail, grime on her face, and the other with scratch marks and sweat congealing all over his white lab coat. Both running for their lives. To an outsider, this would have looked almost comical.

Vera reached the southern edge of the roof and began to clamber down a small rung ladder bolted to the side of the building. Jim followed suit. Flecks of white fluttered around them; the telltale signs of snow just starting to form. They caught in Vera’s hair and Jim’s sweaty brow.

When she was within distance, Vera leapt from the ladder and jumped onto the frosted leafy ground, shoes digging into the sodden dirt. Jim leapt awkwardly as well, yet he wasn’t as graceful as his younger counterpart; and so he landed on his ass. A second later he was up on his feet again and running from the horrors in the building behind him.

They ran for another five minutes through the thick German forest before finally stopping to take a breath. Jim leaned against a tree and wheezed - the childhood asthmatic in him rearing his scrawny, pimply head - whilst Vera doubled over and panted like a dehydrated hound. Jim noticed his hand was still bleeding from where one of them scratched the skin. He peered at the wound. He frowned. Thin grey veins stretched out from it, seeping into his bloodstream. Some kind of infection, he thought. 

His train of thought was interrupted suddenly by a violent cough from Vera. His head snapped up, panicked; just in time to see her throw up the contents of her stomach all over a nearby tree stump. Jim let out a sigh of exasperation and relief.

‘That’s it...’ he said shakily. ‘Get your breath back… better out than in, as they say...’

Vera glared up at him, before turning around and bending over again to chuck up another litre of bile and black coffee. ‘How...’ Cough. ‘How can you...’ Cough. ‘How can you be so - so...’ Vera stood up and wiped her mouth. ‘So cool under the circumstances, Doctor Hopkins?’

Vera turned around to glare at him.

But there was no one there to glare at.

Hopkins was gone.

And, a moment later, before she had time to scream, Doctor Vera Juarez was gone too.

**Author's Note:**

> Zombiepocalypse - what do you guys think?


End file.
